I don't know, but I do want to point out that one of the comments there states that this was "one of ten blindfold games by Alekhine in his exhibition at the Manhattan Chess Club."

Amazing, isn't it? His 10-game blindfold simul tactics are better than mine will ever be

The fact that it's a blindfold simul game makes it kind of pointless to pick apart Alekhine's game too much. It looks like c6 and Nc7 transpose after Nc7 Re4 Ne8 Rg4 c6. I don't see any particular reason to start with c6, but I don't think it spoils anything either.

Is chessvideos.tv down for anyone else right now?

Yes.

Some years ago, I read that "an ability to evaluate positions" is much of what separates GMs from sub-GMs (~2,300-2,400). Any truth in that?

Well I guess, but "an ability to evaluate positions" pretty much equates to "chess skill" so it seems pretty vague to me

I remember someone mentioning something about "sum total of all knowledge" once as a bit of a tongue in cheek way of describing why Karpov/ Kasparov were so much better during their periods of domination. I think it has some merit though in that by accumulating more knowledge players are able to use that to beat their opponents.

Not so much opening theory but more by having more experience in certain situations helps them to win/draw them more often.

To give a simplistic example if I knew more about king and pawn endings than my opponent then I would have a big edge in them if only for the fact that he would have to spend more time working them out than I would. Therefore applying that to more and more refined concepts could give an insight into why certain players have that edge.

Nerves.

Ability to source a new/original idea before getting shafted by time control [Hello Chucky!]

I do think defensive skill is underrated among top players. There's a reason we still talk about Karpov, Petrosian, Lasker.

I can only say it is definitely not endgame knowledge.

Just saw on chess.com that Judit Polgar created her first instructive video for them. I haven't watched it yet so I can't comment on the quality, but the fact that she's making videos for them is cool. They've really got some quality instruction from very strong players.

Internet is truly an amazing place!

I had a related conversation with a friend who is a GM and had an enormous amount of potential yet decided to drop professional chess. His reason was pretty simple. He didn't want to work as much as was needed to keep up with the guys at the top. Can you imagine how much work guys like Svidler and Kramnik put into the candidates event alone? They were uncorking new ideas constantly that clearly weren't spur of the moment inspirations. And I've no doubt that Carlsen isn't as impulsive as it seems in terms of preparation and work. He radically changed his game and even style in the process of getting where he is today. That's not something you just wakeup one day, decide is a nice idea and suddenly you're 2900. To say nothing of the work he does over the board. Grinding out extremely high level games lasting 6+ hours day after day - he's working himself like a dog even at the board!

Random thought for the day: chess.com's tactics trainer is pretty tough. I like it a lot though. Lots of good problems, many of them from actual games. Not too terribly many compositions, except it seems like every endgame position is a study.

Kramnik claims that Carlsen is overrated, and that both he and Anand is as good players as Carlsen is, and the reason why his rating is higher is because of stuff like his psyche and stamina.

I guess you mean the pogonina.com interview posted by Ortho in the other thread - he stated that "I would say that Carlsen is an improved version of Karpov" and never said Carlsen is overrated (which you pointed out yourself). I do think he implied that he expects Anand to, ehm, poop his pants in the match against Magnus like he did against Kasparov, though.

its supposed to be from a interview with a russian tv channel NTV+. I have only read the translated version, maybe they have twisted what he meant. Wether this is the same interview that you refer to i dont know.

Yeah he says he doesn't think Magnus is ahead of people like himself/Aronian/Anand in chess understanding, but his edge comes from elsewhere (focus, motivation etc)

Thanks for posting; this is great.

Yeah, Kramnik is quite complimentary of Carlsen. The part you two refer to doesn't include Anand:

"Magnus is an outstanding, remarkable player. Nonetheless, in my opinion, his hegemony in the chess world is overestimated. I believe that both I and Aronian can match his skills. Well, he has certain qualities: young age, lots of energy, a good nervous system, incredible motivation, killer instinct, but in the chess sense I don’t see why he should be a lot stronger, if at all, (than me or Levon)."

And that's as critical as he gets.

Hey, what are the best sites for high-content chess interviews/articles/etc., apart from ChessCafe? I found Chess in Translation, which is pretty cool albeit sparingly updated these days.

chessbase.com
whychess.com

Also chessvibes.com is very good imo.

Hey did you guys here that the WCC 2013 will be in Chennai, India?

http://www.thehindu.com/news/nationa...cle4594208.ece

Strange to me that the event will be held in the defenders home country, I thought they tried to keep the host nation neutral. This must affect things one way or the other I think, lots of pressure on Anand but a heck of a lot of support too.

Thanks for the news! *marks Nov.6 (probably Nov.7 since there's always the opening day it seems) in the calendar*

Loooool Magnus is hot!
http://www.chessvibes.com/reports/ma...st-men-of-2013

While doing some recon on opponents in a tourney on chess.com I found this game:

http://www.chess.com/echess/game?id=67333404

Can anyone make sense of that?